Today we offer part of an impromptu talk by Gurudeva in which he discusses the issues of separation of Church and State in the context of the upcoming "Millennium World Peace Summit of Religious and Spiritual Leaders" to be held at the UN at the end of August. Gurudeva was invited to attend as a representative of Hinduism.

Unedited Transcript:

(And)It really is for religious leaders and I think, it is quite necessary that [the] UN Conference (to) assist Government and Government assist the religious leaders by giving them all kinds of consideration. Protection, tax breaks, and many other things. It is (also )payback time, too. (Working together,) Church and State working together and yet, they are separate. But they should work together, which they are not. [They are not] working together extremely well. That is the purpose of this conference, to strengthen that togetherness because a lot of these wars are religious wars and the politicians have divided the communities on either religious boundaries or divided them on linguistic boundaries or on color boundaries, in order to control the people.( And,) The successful countries these days don't do that. They try to create a religious harmony, an interracial harmony and a linguistic harmony.

Well, everyone ... we are going to parade to the Iraivan Temple. We are building up a beautiful hill for Lord Muruga, which will have a gentle slope up about 20 or 30 feet,( and) a gentle slope down and a big space at the top. That is where we are putting all the soil that we take off Iraivan Temple foundation.

Thank you very much.